Apple has confirmed that it's taken the number one spot in the western European education market. Apple's education market share in western Europe is now 15.2 per cent, relegating Dell, with 14.7 per cent, to second place.

It seems pretty simple. Buy a Wintel PC and run Unix or Windows or Linux on it.

Buy a Mactel, and you cannot boot anything but OSX on it. Nor can you boot OSX on anything else.

Obviously, the second is more closed than the first. Whether parts of OSX were originally open is not the issue. Nor is it the issue whether you can compile software for OSX.

The question is not whether Macs are a good or a bad thing. The point is that a world in which OS and hardware are locked, and you cannot choose which OS to run on your hardware, would represent a significant loss of personal freedom. So, it would be wise for us to be alert to any increase in market share for this model in public institutions, and to resist its adoption on any scale greater than the present one. Which seems already great enough.

Let's repeat. This is not about whether Macs are good or bad. This is about the implications of a particular model of the industry for personal freedom.

It seems pretty simple. Buy a Wintel PC and run Unix or Windows or Linux on it.

Buy a Mactel, and you cannot boot anything but OSX on it. Nor can you boot OSX on anything else.

It's interesting that you chose to make an example of Mactels. It is only a matter of time until you will be able to boot linux and even Vista on a Mactel. Older Macs can, of course, already run linux, BSD etc. Apple have specifically said that they will not stop people from running Windows on the Mactels.

Sure, you cannot run OS X on anything else than a Mac. But buying a Mac does not mean that you're locked into OS X. So I would say that you're locked into Apple hardware if you want OS X, but not the other way round.